The Sierra Club announced this week that it's sending formal notices of intent to sue to about 30 new coal plants across the country in an effort to force them to better control emissions of mercury and other toxic pollutants. The states where the targeted plants are located include Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, North Carolina, South Carolina and Texas.

"We want to give moms across the country some peace of mind this Mother’s Day," says Bruce Nilles, director of the Sierra Club’s National Coal Campaign. "That’s why we’re taking action today to ensure that these coal plants make every effort to keep their toxic mercury pollution out of our communities."

A recent study from the University of Texas found that children's risk of developing autism, a brain disorder that impairs communication and social interaction, increases with proximity to coal-fired power plants. According to the researchers, a child living 10 miles from a coal-burning power plant has a 2 percent higher risk of developing autism than a child living 20 miles away.

Coal-fired power plants are the single largest man-made source of mercury pollution in the United States. When the plants release mercury into the air, it rains down into lakes, rivers and streams and builds up in the bodies of fish -- and the people who eat the fish.

In February of this year, a federal appeals court struck down the Bush administration's mercury regulations for coal-fired power plants, saying they failed to adequately protect public health. The Sierra Club is asking the coal plant developers to come up with new plans to control mercury and other toxic pollution before the facilities are built.

"There are affordable technologies widely available today that can substantially reduce mercury and other toxic pollution," says Pat Gallagher, director of the Sierra Club's Environmental Law Program. "In their rush to build new coal plants, developers have turned a blind eye to these technologies, and correspondingly the health of children everywhere."

For a map that shows all of the planned coal plants in the United States and their current status, click here.

Labels: autism, coal, energy policy, mercury, public health, Sierra Club

Four out of five North Carolina residents -- including 74 percent of Republicans, 84 percent of Democrats, and 82 percent of Independents -- say the state should focus on increased energy efficiency, conservation and sustainable energy sources before building new coal-fired power plants.

That's among the findings of a new poll conducted by the Opinion Research Corp. for the Civil Society Institute, a nonprofit think tank in Massachusetts. The results were released today -- Earth Day, of course -- by the N.C. Waste Awareness and Reduction Network, a Durham-based group that's fighting to stop Duke Energy from opening a new coal-fired power plant in the western part of the state.

The poll also found that 69 percent of North Carolina residents would pick wind or solar energy if they could decide where to invest money for new electric power generation. In addition, it found that 59 percent of the state's residents -- including majorities of Republicans, Democrats and Independents alike -- would be more likely to vote for a political candidate who spoke out against Duke's plans.

"The pressure to cancel Cliffside will keep growing as the public learns the intensity of our climate crisis," said N.C. WARN Director Jim Warren. "We urge [Duke CEO Jim] Rogers to avoid dragging Duke Energy through a four-year battle against the people of North Carolina."

But when it comes to educating the public about Duke's plans, Warren and his allies have their work cut out for them. The poll found that two-thirds of North Carolina residents have little or no awareness of the company's intention to build the Cliffside facility. Only 34 percent said they were aware of the plans, with just 9 percent "very aware."

Labels: climate, coal, Duke Energy, global warming, Jim Rogers, NCWARN, polls

Two weeks after the arrest of eight people protesting Duke Energy's plans to build a new coal-fired power plant in western North Carolina, another group of activists was detained following a similar action in Virginia.

Three people were arrested yesterday morning while blocking the entrance to Dominion Power's headquarters in Richmond. They were part of a larger group of activists with Blue Ridge Earth First! who were protesting the company's plans to build a new coal-fired power plant in southwest Virginia's Wise County.

"Climate change is jeopardizing my future and I'm not going to just sit by and let Dominion lock us into another generation of dirty coal," said Barbie Spitz, a student who participated in the roadblock.

Dominion's Wise County plant would release 5.4 million tons of carbon dioxide annually as well as 49 pounds of mercury and other hazardous pollutants. The plant's demand for coal would also accelerate the rate of mountaintop removal mining, which has already destroyed 25 percent of Wise County's mountains.

Earth First! also recently blockaded the construction site for FPL's planned gas-fired power plant in Palm Beach County, Fla. That February protest, which was organized by Everglades Earth First!, resulted in the arrest of 27 people. FPL's facility would release 12 millions tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere each year.

(Photo courtesy of Blue Ridge Earth First!; to see more photos from the action, click here.)

Labels: climate, coal, Earth First, global warming, protests, virginia

Last week James E. Hansen, one of the nation's leading scientific experts on climate change, publicly released a letter he sent to Jim Rogers, CEO of North Carolina-based Duke Energy. Citing his new study about how climbing atmospheric carbon levels are putting life on earth at risk, Hansen urged Rogers to cancel plans to build new coal-burning power plants in North Carolina and Indiana.

Noting that coal accounts for half of fossil fuel-related carbon dioxide in the atmosphere today, Hansen said it can safely be used to generate power in the coming decades only if the carbon dioxide released is captured and sequestered. Plants under construction that lack this sequestration technology -- including Duke's Cliffside and another company facility planned for Edwardsport, Ind. -- are a "terrible, foreseeable waste of money," charged Hansen, who directs NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies.

He went on to compare the tactics of Big Coal in fighting climate action to those of Big Tobacco after it became clear that smoking caused serious health problems:

Tobacco companies manufactured and magnified public doubt about scientific evidence; they masqueraded PR as news and expert opinion; they emphasized maintaining "balance" in a "controversy," and they supported doctors and scientists wo disputed the evidence, thus proclaiming concern about discovering the truth while actually suppressing it.

Big Tobacco's playbook proved a great "success." Tobacco profits were so great that court settlements could be paid with hardly a blip on stock values. Can it be any wonder that Big Coal and Big Oil have stolen Big Tobacco's playbook?

Hansen invited Rogers to meet with him for a one-day discussion over the next two or three months with top experts on energy efficiency, renewable energy, carbon capture and nuclear power. Rogers accepted -- though he sounds skeptical the two men will find common ground, the Washington Post reports:

...Rogers, who praised Hansen as "an early voice in the wilderness" on climate change, said the scientist's demand reflects a "snap-your-fingers, instant transition of the economy" mind-set.

"My requirement is to balance reliability, affordability and clean energy," Rogers said. "He's apparently focused on the clean perspective."

(Hansen photo, top, courtesy of GISS; Rogers photo from Duke Energy Web site)

Labels: Cliffside, climate, coal, Duke Energy, James Hansen, Jim Rogers

Eight people were arrested yesterday during a protest at the construction site for North Carolina-based Duke Energy's new Cliffside coal-fired power plant west of Charlotte. Two of those arrested were first shocked with Taser guns after locking themselves to bulldozers. The protesters were charged with trespassing and resisting arrest.

The North Carolina protest was one in a series of actions that took place as part of Fossil Fools Day, an international event organized by Rising Tide with help from other groups including the Rainforest Action Network and Earth First!.

"In the face of catastrophic climate change, building a new coal plant is tantamount to signing a death sentence for our generation," said Matt Wallace, a farmer who lives near Duke's plant and one of the protesters who locked himself to a bulldozer.

Avram Friedman is the executive director of the Canary Coalition, one of the North Carolina groups fighting Duke's plant. He said the police arrested the wrong people, since the protesters were trying to prevent a crime. Those who should be arrested are the N.C. Division of Air Quality officials who granted the facility a permit despite the fact that it doesn't meet federal standards for mercury emissions and Duke Energy officials who started construction before the permit appeals process was over, he said:

They should be arrested for defying scientific evidence, knowingly constructing a powerful instrument that will result in the death, disease and suffering of tens of thousands of people from heart and lung diseases, emphysema, asthma, chronic bronchitis. They should be arrested for contaminating water ways with toxic mercury resulting in neurological damage to children, causing autism and learning disablilities.

Other actions took place yesterday in New York, Boston, the United Kingdom, South Africa and Australia.

(Photo of Cliffside protest by Liz Veazey)

Labels: center for climate strategies, Cliffside, coal, direct action, Duke Energy, Earth First, Fossil Fools Day, global warming, north carolina, protests

In a hearing before the Tennessee Senate Environment and Conservation Committee yesterday, Knoxville based National Coal Corp. said that a proposed ban on mountaintop removal mining would put them out of business and affect hundreds of jobs in the state of Tennessee.

When confronted by environmentalists with more than fifty violations at National Coal sites, the company said they amounted to nothing more than "speeding tickets" and said they could explain most of the violations but weren't prepared to offer any explanations at the hearing because they were "blindsided" by the discussion of the charges.

As originally introduced, SB3822 would have required an environmental impact statement before issuing any surface coal mining permits and would prohibit surface coal mining operations to alter or disturb any ridge line above 2000 feet elevation. Another provision would prohibit surface mining operations "within 100 feet of any water of the state."

According to this Knoxville News Sentinel report on the hearing, opponents asked for and received an opinion from the Tennessee Attorney General that the requirement for an environmental impact statement was in conflict with federal law, so this requirement was dropped from the proposed legislation. The bill was also amended to clarify that it would not apply to "surface coal mining activities that are only incidental to underground coal mining if the department determines that surface disturbance and effect is limited to that required to conduct legal underground coal mining."

Despite these concessions to the coal industry, the Environment and Conservation Committee chairman would not allow a vote and deferred the bill until next week so the Tennessee Attorney General's office could appear before the committee to discuss the legislation.

The sponsor of the amended legislation, which he described as a "weak bill," characterized the move as a "stalling tactic" when in fact the committee appeared ready to vote on it.

The bill has made for some interesting coalitions in the Tennessee General Assembly. State Sen. Raymond Finney, the bill's sponsor, is an ultra-conservative Republican and born again evangelical. The House Sponsor is State Rep. Mike McDonald, an environmentalist and a Democrat. State Sen. Tommy Kilby, the Chairman of the Senate Environment and Conservation Committee who blocked the bill, is also a Democrat. He says he doesn't want to put National Coal out of business and opposes the bill because the company "is providing good jobs, benefiting the state by reclaiming land devastated by abandoned mines, and not investing a dime of taxpayer money," according to the News Sentinel report.

The origin of the legislation is another interesting story. It's a faith-based labor of love by Dawn Coppock, the state's top adoption lawyer. She got involved when the Youth Director at her church, Kathy Lindquist, wrote a column about "creation care" and mountaintop removal in the church's newsletter. Following Ms. Lindquist's death in 2005, Ms. Coppock founded the Lindquist Environmental Appalachian Fellowship (LEAF) to further the cause of faith-based environmental stewardship. She worked with State Sen. Finney to draft the mountatintop removal legislation and has mounted an aggressive lobbying effort to get it passed.

Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen would likely sign the legislation if it ever reaches his desk. Commenting on another proposal to increase coal taxes in the state, Gov. Bredesen remarked "I don’t think we should be a cheap place to mine coal."

Labels: coal, environmental justice, mountaintop removal

Residents of coal mining communities have a significantly higher risk of developing serious health problems, according to a new study by West Virginia University scientists. Compared to the average American, residents of West Virginia's coalfields are 70 percent more likely to develop kidney disease, 64 percent more likely to suffer from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and 30 percent more likely to report high blood pressure.

And the problem isn't limited to West Virginia: The researchers say premature death rates suggest similar health problems afflict the entire Appalachian coal mining region, which stretches from Alabama to Pennsylvania and encompasses parts of Tennessee, Kentucky, Virginia, Maryland and Ohio. They believe environmental pollution from coal-processing chemicals, diesel equipment, explosives, toxic impurities in coal, and dust from uncovered coal trucks are probably to blame.

"Residents of coal-mining communities have long complained of impaired health," said author Michael Hendryx, associate director of the WVU Institute for Health Policy Research. "This study substantiates their claims. Those residents are at an increased risk of developing chronic heart, lung and kidney diseases."

Coal isn't the sole culprit behind the region's poor health; other factors include residents' higher-than-average rates of smoking, poverty and poor education. But even when the researchers controlled for those factors they still found elevated disease rates. They also looked at hospitalization rates in relationship to coal production and found that the risk of hospitalization for COPD increases 1 percent per every 1,462 tons of coal produced and for hypertension by 1 percent per every 1,873 tons.

Hendryx and co-author Melissa Ahern of Washington State University used data from a 2001 WVU Health Policy Research telephone survey of more than 16,400 West Virginians. They correlated that with data from the West Virginia Geological and Economic Survey, which shows volume of coal production in each of the state’s 55 counties. The study, "Relations between Health Indicators and Residential Proximity to Coal Mining in West Virginia," will appear in the April issue of the American Journal of Public Health. Other detailed reports on mortality rates in coal-mining communities will be published in national journals this spring.

"People in coal-mining communities need better access to healthcare, cleaner air, cleaner water, and stricter enforcement of environmental standards," Hendryx said. "Our study helps open the door for further explorations of community health and coal mining. We owe it to people in those communities to start protecting and repairing their health."

Labels: Appalachia, coal, public health, west virginia, west virginia university

Two environmental organizations went to court today in the latest attempt to stop Duke Energy from building a controversial new coal-burning power plant in western North Carolina. In separate lawsuits, Appalachian Voices and the N.C. Waste Awareness and Reduction Network are challenging the state's decision to issue the plant an air pollution permit.

Appalachian Voices' novel legal approach is based on a provision of the Clean Air Act that requires regulators to consider the environmental impacts associated with the entire cycle of coal-generated electricity, which in Duke Energy's case includes mining coal through mountaintop removal. Duke is the nation's third-largest consumer of coal mined via that method, in which explosives are used to blast off mountaintops, with the resulting debris dumped into adjacent river valleys. The practice has already destroyed more than 470 mountain peaks, buried or polluted more than 1,200 miles of headwater streams, and wiped out some 800 square miles of diverse ecosystems in West Virginia, Kentucky, Virginia and Tennessee.

"Giving them a permit for a new coal plant is almost guaranteed to mean devastating impacts in terms of global warming pollution and mountaintop removal mining," says Appalachian Voices Executive Director Mary Anne Hitt.

Earlier this month, Appalachian Voices along with the N.C.-based Canary Coalition filed another federal lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Energy and the Treasury Department that seeks to end taxpayer subsidies for the building of power plants that burn coal mined by mountaintop removal.

Other than West Virginia, North Carolina is the largest consumer of coal mined by mountaintop removal, followed by Kentucky, Georgia, and Virginia. To find out whether your local power plant relies on coal mined this way, click here.

The other suit filed today by N.C. WARN charges that Duke's proposed Cliffside plant would increase emissions of greenhouse gases at the same time the Southeast already has a glut of electricity. It also claims North Carolina violated federal law by failing to require state-of-the-art controls on mercury and other toxic pollutants from the facility, where construction is already underway.

(Photo of mountaintop removal operation courtesy of Appalachian Voices. For more images from the group, click here.)

Labels: Appalachian Voices, Cliffside, coal, Duke Energy, mountaintop removal, NCWARN

Citing a recent federal court ruling, 18 environmental groups have called on the North Carolina Division of Air Quality to reopen the pollution permit it granted last month for Duke Energy's proposed new coal-burning unit at its Cliffside power plant in the western part of the state. In a letter submitted to DAQ, the groups charge that the permit is illegal under the Clean Air Act because it fails to require the toughest controls available for mercury, a potent neurotoxin released from burning coal.

"North Carolina has issued an illegal permit that violates the Clean Air Act and a federal court ruling," said Gudrun Thompson, attorney with the nonprofit Southern Environmental Law Center, which submitted the letter to DAQ. "The Division of Air Quality must now go back and do its homework by first identifying the highest achievable level of control for this hazardous pollutant and then requiring Duke to implement it."

The other signatories include Environment North Carolina, Environmental Defense, National Parks Conservation Association, Natural Resources Defense Council, N.C. Waste Awareness and Reduction Network, Sierra Club's N.C. chapter, Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, Cape Fear Riverkeeper, Catawba Riverkeeper, Lower Neuse Riverkeeper, New Riverkeeper, Pamlico-Tar Riverkeeper, Upper Neuse Riverkeeper, Watauga Riverkeeper, Waccamaw Riverkeeper, Yadkin Riverkeeper, and Cape Fear Coastkeeper.

The permit issued by DAQ would allow Duke's plant to emit mercury at a rate 10 times higher than the Clean Air Act allows. In addition, the permit fails to require or even analyze maximum pollution controls for 66 other hazardous air pollutants emitted by coal-fired power plants, including hydrochloric acid, arsenic, dioxins, and heavy metals other than mercury.

(Photo of Cliffside Steam Station from Duke Energy's Web site)

Labels: coal, Duke Energy, energy policy, environment, north carolina, Southern Environmental Law Center

The Coal Moratorium NOW! conference kicks off this Wednesday in Houston. The two-day event will bring together activists from across the country who are working to stop the building of new coal-fired power plants in their communities.

The event coincides with "America's Energy Future: Houston's Presidential Summit," a Feb. 28 conference sponsored by energy suppliers that will feature a speech by presidential candidate Sen. Hillary Clinton.

Meanwhile, the movement to halt the construction of new coal plants has gotten a boost from the federal government itself. A new report [PDF] from the National Energy Technology Laboratory, a division of the Department of Energy devoted to fossil-fuel research, questions the need for all the new coal-fired power plants now being planned. Titled "Tracking New Coal-Fired Power Plants," the report states:

Coal-fired power plant development activity significantly exceeds the current estimate of need by [the Energy Information Administration].

The report goes on to suggest that efforts to promote energy conservation and efficiency may be having an effect:

Low forecasts of demand growth add an element of "demand uncertainty" to the problems of regulatory uncertainty and rapidly escalating costs for coal-fired power plant development.

Labels: coal, coal moratorium, department of energy, energy policy, national energy technology laboratory

Apparently Muslim extremists aren't the only ones angered by irreverent political cartoons.

Kentucky state Rep. Jim Gooch, a Democrat who chairs the Natural Resources and Environment Committee, is unhappy about the way he's been portrayed by editorial cartoonists because of his efforts to kill a coal mine safety bill and declare global warming a hoax. One recent cartoon showed him basking in a hot tub with King Coal.

In response, Gooch is pushing legislation that would classify editorial cartoonists and editorial writers as lobbyists, which would effectively ban them from the House and Senate chambers while lawmakers are in session. David Thompson, executive director of the Kentucky Press Association, told the Associated Press that the legislation is an obvious First Amendment violation:

"If I had to classify it, I think it's harassment."

But Gooch claims his bill is simply an effort to rein in abuses by a too-free press:

"It’s almost as if they want to silence you," he said. "They want to hurt your credibility. They do it by either trying to make you look stupid or corrupt."

As you may recall, Gooch is the same fellow who held a hearing on global warming but declined to invite any scientists. Instead, the featured speakers were Lord Christopher Monckton, an adviser to former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher who once called for HIV/AIDS patients to be locked up for life, and James Taylor, a Florida-based fellow with the Exxon-funded Heartland Institute, which a Facing South investigation found has been fighting state efforts to regulate greenhouse gas pollution.

(Photo of Jim Gooch from Kentucky House of Representatives' Web site)

Labels: coal, global warming, kentucky, media, politics

A federal appeals court on Friday decided that an Environmental Protection Agency rule that left coal- and oil-fired power plants off the hook for tough mercury controls violated the Clean Air Act. The decision cheered opponents of Duke Energy's planned Cliffside power plant in western North Carolina who were recently disappointed by the state's decision to permit the facility.

The ruling [PDF] by the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals invalidates EPA's so-called "Clean Air Mercury Rule," which would have allowed dangerously high levels of mercury pollution to be emitted by some coal-fired power plants under a pollution cap-and-trade program. The court found that EPA illegally removed power plants from the most protective requirements of the Clean Air Act simply because it believed it had the authority to do so, a move that led the court to comment:

"This explanation deploys the logic of the Queen of Hearts."

As a consequence of the decision, air permits for new coal plants such as Cliffside will have to be based on a case-by-case analysis of the best available technology for controlling mercury and other hazardous pollution. Last month, the Southern Environmental Law Center -- which sued EPA over the mercury cap-and-trade rule on behalf of several public-health organizations -- notified North Carolina regulators about the court's expected decision and called on them to consider the tougher mercury regulations when developing its final permit, advice the state Division of Air Quality failed to heed.

N.C. Waste Awareness and Reduction Network Director Jim Warren (who last week debated Duke Energy executive Tom Williams on North Carolina Public Radio) points out that DAQ's permit for Cliffside doesn't require analysis of what's known as "maximum available control technology" (MACT) for mercury and doesn't require Duke Energy to install mercury-specific pollution control equipment, noting:

The D.C. Circuit's ruling means that DAQ must rescind the final Cliffside air permit, go back to the drawing board to conduct a case-specific MACT analysis, and issue a revised draft permit for public comment before finalizing a new permit.

Labels: coal, environment, regulatory oversight

Bucking a national trend away from coal-burning power plants, North Carolina regulators yesterday issued a permit allowing Duke Energy to build a massive new coal-fired unit at its Cliffside plant in the western part of the state. The company plans to begin construction on the $2.4 billion project immediately and hopes to have the facility up and running by 2012.

The decision to permit the new unit comes despite serious concerns raised about its impact on climate, public health, and air quality in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. It also comes amidst an ongoing lawsuit brought against the Charlotte-based company by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency over its failure to meet pollution control requirements.

Environmental advocates who had been fighting the project denounced North Carolina's decision and criticized what they called misleading statements made by Duke and state regulators about the facility's environmental impact. According to a statement issued yesterday by N.C. Waste Awareness and Reduction Network Director Jim Warren:

"The State and Duke Energy seem to be working in tandem to put lipstick on a pig, based on their coordinated announcements today. Despite their withering campaign of distortion, building the Cliffside power plant is a losing strategy for the climate crisis, air quality and mercury poisoning of the North Carolina public."

Warren pointed out that the final permit included only a "slight, token" reduction in mercury limits over the draft version -- and the reduction was based on a recalculation of mercury emissions rather than any required changes to controls. This means the planned facility will be out of compliance with federal rules limiting mercury emissions, Warren said.

He also blasted Duke's and North Carolina's claims that Cliffside will be "carbon neutral" by 2018. He called that a "meaningless statement" based on "vague promises" of carbon offsets elsewhere in the company's operations. In fact, the new Cliffside unit is expected to emit more than 6 million tons of carbon dioxide each year, which is 12 times more than what's emitted by the four smaller units the company plans to retire. It's also expected to emit 405 pounds of mercury, a potent neurotoxin, each year, and use 120 million gallons of water a day in a region that's suffering from an extraordinary drought.

Cliffside opponents have also raised concerns about Duke Energy's enormous political influence in the state. Indeed, the company's political action committee consistently ranks among the 10 largest in the state and among the five largest sponsored by a single company, according to a recent study [PDF] by Democracy North Carolina. Duke Energy also ranked in the top 10 energy-industry contributors during the 2004 and 2006 election cycles, according to a recent study [PDF] by the National Institute on Money in State Politics.

The Canary Coalition, a clean air advocacy group based in western North Carolina, has called for protests against Cliffside to continue until the plans are abandoned. The group is promoting weekly boycott actions against the company, with concerned citizens asked to turn off their lights every Sunday at 8 p.m. and to place an LED candle in the window in solidarity.

(Photo courtesy of the Canary Coalition.)

Labels: coal, energy policy, north carolina

It's been a rough week for Southern power giant Duke Energy.

A federal lawsuit filed this week accuses the Charlotte, N.C.-based utility of paying off opponents to its 2004 Ohio rate hike with as much as $100 million in special rebates, arguing that the special deals represented fraud that hurt other consumers. The rebate program was launched by Cinergy before Duke's 2005 merger with the Cincinnati-based power provider.

The attorneys behind the suit against Duke include Stanley Chesley, an Ohio trial lawyer whose first claim to fame arose from his role following the 1977 Beverly Hills Supper Club fire that killed 165 people. Rather than sue just the nightclub, Chesley targeted the entire aluminum electrical wire industry, eventually winning $49 million in verdicts and settlements. Chesley has also been involved in other high-profile cases including suits against Pan Am over the Lockerbie terrorist attack, Dow Corning over breast implants, and the $246 billion tobacco settlement on behalf of state governments.

In an official statement, Duke Energy said it "believes the allegations are without merit and will vigorously defend itself."

Also this week, Duke Energy and its plans to expand a coal-fired power plant in western North Carolina have been the target of full-page attacks ads running in newspapers across the state. Sponsored by the N.C. Waste Awareness and Reduction Network, the ads call on citizens to press for the cancellation of the Cliffside project by e-mailing CEO Jim Rogers and by urging the media, N.C. Gov. Mike Easley and other public officials to stand up to Duke Energy. The ads quote Dr. James Hansen, director of NASA's Goddard Institute:

"Business-as-usual, if it continues for even another decade, will be disastrous …. Stopping this new coal plant is the best thing North Carolina can do to slow global warming."

Last month N.C.WARN and 10 other groups sent a letter to Rogers urging him to reconsider the Cliffside expansion due to its impact on the climate. The 800 megawatt Cliffside plant would release 6 million tons of greenhouse gases annually for the next 50 years and would double daily water evaporation from present levels to 21 million gallons per day. Much of North Carolina, including the region where the plant is located, is currently experiencing an exceptional drought.

As if that weren't enough trouble for one week, Moody's Investor Service this week downgraded its outlook for Duke Energy from "Positive" to "Stable," saying the company's expected cash flow will not be enough to cover significant capital investments planned for this year. The company's shares fell 11 cents following the announcement.

Labels: climate, coal

An administrative law judge has upheld Georgia's decision to issue an air pollution permit for Dynegy's proposed coal-burning power plant in Early County. But environmental attorneys say they will appeal, charging that the judge ignored evidence that the company will not adequately restrict pollution from the Longleaf plant that threatens human health and crops critical to the local economy.

"This is the first coal-fired power permit to be approved in Georgia in over 20 years but with this court's ruling, I fear it will not be the last," says Justine Thompson, executive director of GreenLaw, which is leading the legal fight against the plant. "As neighboring states stand up against coal plants, Georgia's acquiescence will make us a target for new coal-fired power plant proposals. Building this plant as currently designed will lock this state into dirty air for the life of the plant, at least 50 or more years."

Georgia's decision comes as plans for other coal-fired projects across the United States have been canceled or delayed due to rising construction costs and concerns about greenhouse gas emissions. James Hansen, a scientist who runs NASA's Goddard Space Center, has said he believes the government will be forced to regulate coal plants out of existence in the near future due to climate concerns.

During the hearing for Dynegy's proposed plant, GreenLaw attorney George Hays pointed out that the state Environmental Protection Division staff could not explain how permit limits for harmful soot and smog had been reached and said that state employees adopted conclusions proposed by Dynegy verbatim and without independent verification. The Houston-based Dynegy has proposed building more new coal-fired power plants than any other U.S. company.

Environmental advocates, health care providers and patient groups oppose the plant, and the Medical Association of Georgia issued a resolution opposing the building of any new coal-fired plants in the state, which already has 10 such facilities. The proposed Dynegy plant would emit 9 million tons of carbon dioxide pollution annually and 4,700 tons of sulfur dioxide. The plant's particulate emissions would violate the Environmental Protection Agency's standards for safe air in the community where the plant is located, and the facility would draw more than 20 million gallons of water per day from the Chattahoochee River, which has already been impacted by the region's severe ongoing drought.

Early County -- where African Americans make up almost half of the population and more than a quarter of the population lives in poverty -- already faces a serious pollution problem from Great Southern Paper Co.'s papermill. According to EPA's Toxic Release Inventory, the mill released more than 2 million pounds of toxic chemicals to the air in 2005 alone, including 240 pounds of lead, 47 pounds of mercury -- both potent neurotoxins -- and more than 2,200 pounds of benzene, a known carcinogen. Dynegy's plant would dramatically increase the local community's toxic burden.

For more details on the proposed plant's impact on environmental justice, see the comments [PDF] submitted to state regulators by the Georgia Center for Law in the Public Interest, which has since changed its name to GreenLaw. For a copy of the judge's ruling, click here [PDF]. And for more on the fight against Georgia's coal plants, visit www.nonewcoal.org.

Labels: coal, energy policy, environment, Georgia, global warming

If you don't live in the coalfields of Appalachia, you may not think that mountaintop coal removal has much to do with your life.

Think again -- with help from the folks at Appalachian Voices.

The Boone, N.C.-based nonprofit has unveiled a new online tool that reveals whether and how your electric company is connected to mountaintop removal, the nasty practice of blasting away the tops of mountains and dumping them into neighboring valleys and streams in order to reach the coal below. The site also tells you what you can do to bring an end to the devastation.

As Scott Gollwitzer, in-house counsel for Appalachian Voices, noted in an e-mail announcing the new site:

The coal companies want you to believe that mountaintop removal is just a local issue. But nearly every American is connected to mountaintop removal in some way, and ending this practice is our shared national responsibility.

Labels: coal, environment

Yesterday the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced a record $4.6 billion settlement with American Electric Power in a lawsuit brought by eight northeastern states and a number of environmental advocacy groups. The Ohio-based company also agreed to install pollution controls in order to reduce air pollution coming from its facilities, including coal-burning plants in Virginia, West Virginia and Kentucky.

"Less air pollution from power plants means fewer cases of asthma and other respiratory illnesses," said Granta Nakayama, assistant administrator for EPA’s enforcement and compliance assurance program.

It's true that the settlement reached with the company will allow millions of people to breathe cleaner air. But it also raises a question: What will the company do with the additional coal combustion waste collected after installing more effective emissions controls?

The EPA currently does not regulate coal combustion waste as hazardous waste, and this lack of regulation is creating serious environmental problems. Across the South and the nation, coal combustion waste landfills and surface impoundments have released to the environmental toxic chemicals and metals including arsenic, lead and cadmium at levels dangerous to human health. At least 23 states including Texas, Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina have poisoned surface or groundwater supplies from the improper disposal of coal ash. As we reported last month, the agency recently released a draft risk assessment on coal combustion waste disposal that found unlined coal ash waste ponds pose a cancer risk 900 times above what the government considers acceptable.

Environmental advocacy groups have been urging EPA to begin regulating coal combustion waste as hazardous waste, and the agency is now accepting public comments on the matter. The AEP settlement and the additional waste the company's cleanup efforts will create highlight the importance of addressing this environmental hazard soon.

Labels: coal, environment, public health, regulatory oversight

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is currently seeking comments from the public about worrisome new information on the disposal of waste from burning coal -- and how the information should affect the way the agency regulates such waste.

In a Federal Register notice published Aug. 29, EPA announced the availability of new information and data contained in documents including a joint U.S. Department of Energy and EPA report titled Coal Combustion Waste Management at Landfills and Surface Impoundments, 1994-2004 and a draft risk assessment conducted by EPA on the management of CCW in landfills and surface impoundments.

The risk assessment examined 181 coal combustion waste disposal sites throughout the country and found that unlined coal ash waste ponds pose a cancer risk 900 times above what the government considers "acceptable." The report also found that coal ash disposal sites release toxic chemicals and metals such as arsenic, lead, boron, selenium, cadmium, thallium, and other pollutants at levels that endanger human health and the environment.

Environmental and public health advocacy groups including Earthjustice, the Clean Air Task Force and the Environmental Integrity Project have long called for regulations on the toxic ash produced by coal-fired power plants. Instead, a common industry practice is to mix the material with water and dump it into unlined or inadequately lined ponds, allowing pollutants to seep into groundwater supplies.

Just today, the Annapolis (Md.) Capital newspaper reported on a rural community grappling with drinking wells that are contaminated with cadmium, thallium and other toxic metals due to a nearby coal combustion waste dump operated by Baltimore-based Constellation Energy. According to Earthjustice, at least 23 states have poisoned surface or groundwater supplies from improper disposal of coal ash, including Texas, Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina.

The EPA report found that coal ash dumped in unlined or clay-lined ponds and landfills pose the greatest risk. According to data collected in 1995, more than 60 percent of the country's coal ash disposal units are unlined or clay-lined. While the use of a composite liner significantly reduces the risk of exposure to health-threatening pollution, the federal government and most states do not require such protective measures.

"Strict standards regulating the disposal of coal ash are long overdue," Earthjustice attorney Lisa Evans said in a statement. "There is no excuse for further delay. The EPA has the data. They know how grave the health risk is and yet still millions of people remain exposed to this dangerous waste. Coal ash is our country's second largest source of industrial waste, and it's time the EPA made these polluters do their part to clean up."

About 129 million tons of coal ash is generated each year in the United States and dumped in some 600 coal ash landfills and industrial waste ponds. Among the nation's top 15 coal ash-producing states, eight are in the South: Kentucky, Texas, West Virginia, Florida, Tennessee, North Carolina, Alabama and Georgia. For a complete list of coal ash generated by state, click here (PDF).

Labels: coal, environment, public health, regulatory oversight